I have lived not between one but two major train lines (they were diverting from a common station), the one on the backside of the house was maybe 10m away, the one from the terrace was a lazy stone throw away. This was in Zürich and the trains there are massive, frequent S-Bahns but also freight trains (all of them electric):
You dont really hear them at all, I sometimes was shocked because there was a fast train coming from behind and I didnt hear it until it was right next to me.
There was 2 days a year, when in the night the rails were grinded, I could hear that and it took maybe 1-2 hours of my sleep, but it was announced weeks in advance.
The rails can emit a screeching sound, but that is usually well blocked by the house.
In contrast I have also lived on the side of a “main street” of a rather small village, maybe 10k inhabitants, that shit was unbearable. You heard everything the motor sound, the tires, the honks, the brakes, the music, trucks hitting a pothole would wake me up every night and so would motorcycles.
It is not a predictable woooOOoooosh like a train every half an hour, but instead an assortment of the worst combination of sounds possible that came and went all through the night. When “rush hour” set in at 6 in the morning you could forget to sleep, even on weekends.
There already was a 30km/h speed limit and a speed camera to curb the noise but it still was batshit. I moved 6 months in because I legitimately developed anger issues fueled by sleep deprivation.
I have lived not between one but two major train lines (they were diverting from a common station), the one on the backside of the house was maybe 10m away, the one from the terrace was a lazy stone throw away. This was in Zürich and the trains there are massive, frequent S-Bahns but also freight trains (all of them electric):
You dont really hear them at all, I sometimes was shocked because there was a fast train coming from behind and I didnt hear it until it was right next to me.
There was 2 days a year, when in the night the rails were grinded, I could hear that and it took maybe 1-2 hours of my sleep, but it was announced weeks in advance.
The rails can emit a screeching sound, but that is usually well blocked by the house.
In contrast I have also lived on the side of a “main street” of a rather small village, maybe 10k inhabitants, that shit was unbearable. You heard everything the motor sound, the tires, the honks, the brakes, the music, trucks hitting a pothole would wake me up every night and so would motorcycles.
It is not a predictable woooOOoooosh like a train every half an hour, but instead an assortment of the worst combination of sounds possible that came and went all through the night. When “rush hour” set in at 6 in the morning you could forget to sleep, even on weekends.
There already was a 30km/h speed limit and a speed camera to curb the noise but it still was batshit. I moved 6 months in because I legitimately developed anger issues fueled by sleep deprivation.